This month I celebrated my 32nd birthday. Celebrating my birthday has, for the last few years, come with some perilous emotions. But this year was truly different. Indeed, as I discovered (and admittedly pulled out!) a greatly symbolic white hair just the day before my birthday, I was reminded of that wonderful verse in Proverbs 16:31: "Grey hair is a crown of glory; it is gained in a righteous life." Whether or not my life can be judged as righteous I must leave to God to decide - but what I can say with certainty is that while this last year has been a hard one, I count the life lessons it has taught me as hard-won and precious treasure that I would not be without, and that I pray do help me to glorify God a little more than I did before. In fact, as I recently reflected with someone about those lessons learned, they said to me, 'It feels like this is the beginning of the rest of your life'. So this little poem is my 'Amen' to that!
Goodbye blissful complacency of eating whatever I want and 'getting away with it'.
Goodbye ability to kneel on the floor without discomfort.
Goodbye watertight bladder that never fails - even when I sneeze.
Hello white and wiry hair number 2.
Hello belly tyre. And bum wobble. And rear thigh bulge.
Hello strange dance required for donning my tights.
Goodbye "young woman",
and all the related neuroses of holding that title.
Hello prime of my womanhood,
and all the reward of life lessons learned in getting here.
Hello the beginning of the rest of my life.
I'm ready.
Thursday, 25 January 2018
Saturday, 6 January 2018
Come, Holy Babe
This poem was written and shared with me by one of my former Bible College tutors, and I liked it so much I wanted to record and share it here.
Come, holy babe, come down once more to dwell in flesh, we pray,
But leave behind the swaddling bands, the stable and the hay;
Come lie within a manger in God’s image, made of clay –
Come, holy babe, come down once more to dwell in flesh, we pray.
Come, holy babe, disrupt our nights and rob us of our sleep;
Rouse us from our lethargy until we leave our sheep
And stumble into Bethlehem to see a baby weep –
Come, holy babe, disrupt our nights and rob us of our sleep.
Come, holy babe, and take us through the empty desert sands,
Guided by a far-off star to dim and distant lands
To give away our life and then to leave with empty hands –
Come, holy babe, and take us through the empty desert sands.
Come, holy babe, and send us dreams to take away our ease,
Force us from our house of bread to live as refugees,
To crawl into an alien land upon our hands and knees –
Come, holy babe, and send us dreams to take away our ease.
For you went forth with just a stone on which to lay your head,
You went into a desert place from which the angels fled;
You waged a war with darkness, and you came back from the dead –
So come again Immanuel; wage war with us instead.
You came not just to bring us peace; you came to bring a sword
With which to slay those fantasies that leave us, oh, so bored;
Come, overturn our tables with the trinkets that we hoard –
Come, holy babe, into our hearts – and swing your two-edged sword!
© Richard Johnson
Come, holy babe, come down once more to dwell in flesh, we pray,
But leave behind the swaddling bands, the stable and the hay;
Come lie within a manger in God’s image, made of clay –
Come, holy babe, come down once more to dwell in flesh, we pray.
Come, holy babe, disrupt our nights and rob us of our sleep;
Rouse us from our lethargy until we leave our sheep
And stumble into Bethlehem to see a baby weep –
Come, holy babe, disrupt our nights and rob us of our sleep.
Come, holy babe, and take us through the empty desert sands,
Guided by a far-off star to dim and distant lands
To give away our life and then to leave with empty hands –
Come, holy babe, and take us through the empty desert sands.
Come, holy babe, and send us dreams to take away our ease,
Force us from our house of bread to live as refugees,
To crawl into an alien land upon our hands and knees –
Come, holy babe, and send us dreams to take away our ease.
For you went forth with just a stone on which to lay your head,
You went into a desert place from which the angels fled;
You waged a war with darkness, and you came back from the dead –
So come again Immanuel; wage war with us instead.
You came not just to bring us peace; you came to bring a sword
With which to slay those fantasies that leave us, oh, so bored;
Come, overturn our tables with the trinkets that we hoard –
Come, holy babe, into our hearts – and swing your two-edged sword!
© Richard Johnson
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